Immigrant wave pours into South Texas

A stream of immigrants is captured on a hidden camera, walking at night through ranchland in the McAllen Border Patrol Station area of operations. The owner of this video asked that the exact location be withheld to protect his or her identity.

Photo By Photos by Edward A. Ornelas / San Antonio Express-News

A Border Patrol vehicle drives along the border fence in Penitas. The area is seeing a rise in illegal immigration.

Photo By Edward A. Ornelas / San Antonio Express-News

Two undocumented immigrants from Mexico rest after being caught by U.S. agents near La Joya.

A view of Iglesia San Jose along Military Road Sunday April 7, 2013 in Havana, Tx.

Photo By Edward A. Ornelas/San Antonio Express-News

A building for sale Sunday April 7, 2013 near La Joya, TX.

LA JOYA — Just north of the green waters of the Rio Grande, in a barren soccer field framed by rusty goal posts, Mike Salinas stood in the shadow of an abandoned Border Patrol substation.

When Border Patrol set up operations here in late 2011, it immediately slowed immigrant traffic through town, said Salinas, who lives on a 12-acre plot nearby.

But just as locals came to depend on the agents who staffed the corrugated metal trailer, the station was shuttered last year, and immigrants returned in greater numbers than before.

“It's intimidating,” Salinas said of the recent influx of immigrants. “I've called Border Patrol brass to ask what's going on, and nobody has been able to give me a straight answer.”

Illegal immigration along the southern border has steadily declined for years, but recently the opposite is true in South Texas, based on apprehension numbers, an inexact but useful indicator. Apprehensions by the Border Patrol have soared in the Rio Grande Valley sector, increasing last fiscal year for the first time since 2005, and are on pace to exceed the total of 110,528 in 2006.

The surge has accelerated in recent months, driving a 12 percent spike nationwide.

The Laredo and Del Rio sectors also saw increased captures.

The agency's McAllen station, which covers a 46-mile stretch of the river, including La Joya, has responded to these increases by pulling agents out of the field to help clear holding cells overflowing with detainees, leaving swaths of heavily trafficked border unmanned, members of the Border Patrol's union here said.

When asked how agents would account for the people getting away, a supervisor quipped: “'If a tree falls in the woods and there's nobody there, does it make a sound?'” Cabrera recalled.

At a time when Obama administration officials are touting staffing and technology advances for greatly reducing illegal activity along the border, the latest data have fueled criticism that the border is dangerously exposed, and the union says the agency isn't prepared to deal with the sudden wave of immigrant apprehensions in Texas.

Stretched thin

Tensions reached a boiling point last month when a single agent was assigned to field duty in the middle of a three-day stretch during which nearly 900 immigrants were apprehended, according to the union.

Shortly after, river boat patrols were reduced to a single eight-hour shift, exacerbating feelings of vulnerability in the field, even as some worry conditions inside the McAllen station are at a breaking point.

Despite fewer agents on the ground, groups of 50 and 100 immigrants are being caught with regularity, pushing apprehension numbers higher.

Earlier this month, more than 500 immigrants were being held in a cell intended for 270, the union said, a situation ripe for conflict.

“The cells are not designed to be long-term holding facilities,” Cabrera said. “There's no beds, you just lay on the floor where you can. It's very crowded, it's filthy, it's disgusting, it smells. In my opinion, it's just a matter of time before someone goes off the deep end.”

Brooks noted that while nationwide apprehensions had increased last fiscal year, they were still significantly lower than numbers in 2000.

The McAllen station expects to receive more reinforcements to bolster efforts in the field and in the office, the union said, but many of those agents would be shifted from Laredo or other neighboring stations that are experiencing significant apprehension increases of their own.

The reassignment changes are part of the South Texas Campaign, a push to address threats in the South Texas corridor.

The campaign relies on integrated law enforcement efforts, especially in communities on the smuggling routes, and enhanced coordination with the Mexican government to disrupt criminal organizations.

To confront the upswing, Border Patrol said it already has made significant investments in additional enforcement resources, drawing agents from Laredo to help process and transfer detainees to Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facilities.

The South Texas corridor, especially Hidalgo County, is “an ideal location” for human and drug smuggling, said Jose C. Rodriguez III, the Weslaco-based Texas Department of Public Safety commander, who oversees a region stretching from San Antonio, west to Del Rio and south to the Rio Grande Valley.

With an international airport and major highways connecting to Mexico's interior, Reynosa has become the hub for illegal trade.

Smuggling operations launched from there seamlessly blend in with billions of dollars worth of legitimate business traffic headed to markets in San Antonio, Dallas and Houston. In minutes, immigrants are in residential areas, whisked by waiting vehicles to stash houses where they hole up until smuggled north.

Law enforcement officials in South Texas have stumbled across immigrant stash houses holding dozens of people — sometimes locked inside — in unsanitary conditions.

A year ago in Edinburg, police discovered 115 people held in a house. Smugglers allegedly greeted immigrants with “Welcome to hell,” when they arrived there.

In a two-day period last year, Border Patrol agents found 131 immigrants in a house in Alton and 28 more in Edinburg the following day.

The high-volume smuggling routes also have created a public safety hazard, with occasionally fatal consequences, Rodriguez said.

Hidalgo County consistently leads the state in the number of highway patrol pursuits of vehicles transporting immigrants, recording 95 pursuits in 2012, 71 more than the county with the second most.

Last summer, 15 immigrants from Guatemala were killed when the truck they were being smuggled in ran off a highway in Goliad County. And in March, seven immigrants were killed after a pickup packed with 15 people crashed into a security barrier at the Kingsville Naval Air Station with police in pursuit.

“Some of the pursuits go through school zones, passing school buses,” Rodriguez said. “Pedestrians get hit. So it has a big impact on the community. And in the Rio Grande Valley, it's a very popular area and they try to blend in ... (but) once they're singled out, they don't stop.”

Law enforcement also is discovering record numbers of immigrants who have died traversing the vast South Texas ranchlands. Last year, the remains of 150 immigrants were found in the Rio Grande Valley, and the death toll continues to climb.

'Whac-A-Mole'

Conservatives have been quick to seize on increased crossings statistics to dispute administration claims that the border is the safest it's ever been.

Since Barack Obama took office in 2009, DHS officials have pointed to the declining Border Patrol apprehensions and low homicide rates in border cities as evidence that the country is ready to move forward on comprehensive immigration reform.

Homicide rates still are among the lowest in the country, but McCaul described the administration's approach to border security as “ad hoc,” pointing to declining apprehensions in the Tucson sector while Texas is experiencing huge increases.

“Those are not good numbers,” McCaul said. “That shows that you plug one hole, you're playing a Whac-A-Mole game on the border. You need to look at the border as a whole.”

Cornyn added that “the border is not uniform or monolithic ... what works in Arizona may or may not work, or needs to be adapted, for Texas.”

Texas' rising apprehension numbers have surfaced at an particularly delicate moment as the so-called Gang of Eight senators in Washington have mostly agreed on an immigration bill that hinges on strict border enforcement measures before millions of immigrants who entered illegally could begin moving toward citizenship.

The bipartisan group of senators have set lofty expectations for measuring border security, including 90 percent effectiveness and constant surveillance of the entire border within five years.

The Homeland Security Department would receive $3.5 billion and likely rely on powerful sensors like the one aboard a U.S. surveillance drone that revealed border agents are catching only about half of the immigrants who cross illegally into Arizona, according to documents obtained by the Center for Investigative Reporting.

Given the daunting task of reaching 90 percent effectiveness, Adam Isacson, senior associate of the Washington Office on Latin America research group, questioned whether a path to citizenship ever will be achievable.

“Is (this) a poison pill?” Isacson asked.

With lawmakers moving closer to introducing a bill, many immigrants apprehended in recent months have cited immigration reform as one of their motivations for entering the U.S. illegally, said Border Patrol agents in the Rio Grande Valley.

Republicans have been demanding more resources at the border, even while the Border Patrol staff doubled and apprehensions fell precipitously, a position Cuellar described as “moving the goal posts.”

Still, he supports the Texas Republicans' idea of creating a better way of tracking border security but said that should not preclude comprehensive immigration reform, which the congressman believes would enhance border security, not hinder it, as some argue.

“If you have a good, flexible guest-worker plan, people who want to can come into the country legally,” Cuellar said. “Then Border Patrol can focus their full resources on people who are trying to bring in drugs and smuggle people in.”

Never ending

In La Joya, residents have grown weary of high-speed chases through their neighborhoods and waking up to immigrants hiding in their yards.

On one occasion, Border Patrol agents pursued a group of 20 immigrants through City Councilman Salinas' backyard in the middle of a birthday party barbeque.

“A couple sat down at the table and pretended to be guests at the party,” Salinas said matter of factly.

The city took matters into its own hands in late 2011 when it passed an ordinance prohibiting loitering, targeting local scouts aiding Mexican smuggling operations.

And yet, it has done little to deter immigrants from crossing. Across the river, at a migrant shelter in Reynosa, the Rev. Hector Silva pulled out thick binders filled with the names of migrants who had passed through his complex.

“This is November,” Silva said, dropping a 3-inch-thick binder on the table.

One of the shelter's residents earlier this year, who offered only his last name, Rivas, said he was biding his time until his wife in Oklahoma could scrape together enough money to pay a coyote to smuggle him across the border, something he claimed to have done numerous times over the years.

Rivas shook his head at the money and manpower invested in stopping immigrants.

“The United States is never going to stop immigration,” he said. “They deport 10 and 100 more enter.”